Stay on target

As is to be expected with smaller films angling for Oscar-season attention to boost their visibility, Destroyer – which comes courtesy director Karyn Kusama – is, as of this writing, being sold mainly as a harder-than-normal arthouse pic that’s really only getting a big push because its seen as a potential vehicle to net a Best Actress nomination for Nicole Kidman. And, to be sure, she is absolutely the center of the production’s gravity; delivering a tour-de-force performance that’s all the more impressive considering she can be seen beating up fish-people in ridiculous-looking plastic armor in Aquaman with equally sincere commitment elsewhere at the multiplex.

Still, it’s hard to regard the film as a whole and not come away hoping that, as the nomination period continues to chug along, the studio will eventually note that despite the low budget and profile what they’ve also got is actually a rock-solid, nasty, old-school, hard-bitten cop drama; albeit one that, yes, is also a character piece front-loaded with the gimmick of seeing one of modern Hollywood’s most glamorous actresses transform herself through subtle makeup, costuming, and a fearsome physical performance into a haggard instrument of violent personal justice Kidman’s world-weary detective looks to have had the shit so thoroughly beaten out of her by life you can imagine the heroes of a Mickey Spillane novel (or Mickey Rourke from Sin City) looking at her and asking if she could use an Advil.

We don’t necessarily find out everything that’s brought Kidman’s rough hewn character to the point of being an alternately terrifying but also pitied and soundly disliked figure; but we eventually come to understand that it started with an undercover gangland operation that went really bad when she was still green and idealistic – and that life has been something of a drain ever since: As the film opens, she’s begun to suspect that a dangerous criminal figure from that operation has resurfaced and commits herself to finding them and settling… whatever it is she feels she needs to settle.

And as we watch her stalk, shoot, bludgeon, and bully her way to the truth it becomes increasingly clear… well, that things aren’t actually clear at all: Her motives, the motives of others involved, the origin of all the pain she’s in, what exactly she’s planning to do, the why and how of its connection to her estranged ex husband and teenage daughter, and even the sequence of events themselves.

It’s difficult to get into much more detail beyond that – this is a stripped-down crime film with a narrative gimmick involving the nested flashbacks to the undercover operation that serves as the heroine’s origin story (and allows the star to further demonstrate her potent abilities by playing the years-younger “un-ruined” version of the same character without missing a beat) and it’s not much outside of that, at least in the details that can be discussed without giving away the the hooks and twists that feel like the main draw outside seeing Kidman craft a lady version of the Bad Lieutenant vibe.

But while yes the reason to see it is Kidman and not just for the physicality of it (she also renders tremendous psychological and emotional depths to a character that has to start out as the most off-putting person you can imagine and become somehow more relatable and compelling as she becomes even LESS likable) Kusama’s direction also affords a grimy sun-baked atmosphere that feels authentically sketchy but alive and inhabited: You don’t want to go to the places in this movie, but you feel like you could.

And while it’s certainly not an “action” film (there’s two fight scenes, a robbery, and one VERY satisfying gun battle) when the brutality does arrive it’s punishing and powerful but also studiously realistic from the out-of-breath chases to the scrappy bloody-knuckle/cracked-skull/teeth-smashing beatdowns. The only reason some of the violence on display doesn’t feel like outright sadism is that no bullets or blades could possibly be as intimidating as the way Kidman turns on a dime from a cornered feral animal with a fiery “don’t fuck with me” glare to a nail-spitting banshee ready to bite your throat out.

As goes without saying in modern-day police films, there’s a twist I’m obviously avoiding spoiling at play that will likely color your eventual reaction. Without giving anything away, the first time through it felt gimmicky and unnecessary in the moment, but I’ve warmed to its presence and the way it re-contextualizes things we thought we saw or knew… and “unnecessary” or not it doesn’t take anything away from that stunner of a lead performance. Sometimes the hype is telling the truth – she’s really as good in this as you’ve heard.